Chabria: California takes the lead on hate. That's a good thing. Someone has to
How do you stop hate crimes? How do you even know where to begin?
California is taking a nation-leading step to answer those questions with two new state-sponsored and -funded efforts. The Commission on the State of Hate seeks to understand why hate crimes are rising and how to combat them. The Governor's Council on Holocaust and Genocide Education examines how to inoculate California schoolkids against the misinformation and propaganda that kindle animosity.
I'm not a big one for committees when it comes to solving problems. But these are different, both because of the people on them (a no-nonsense group known for getting results) and their strategic mission to come up with solutions that can be implemented in law enforcement, classrooms and every place where hate's toehold plagues the Golden State.
As hate commission member and transgender activist Bamby Salcedo put it, "It's important for all of us to wake up and to understand that hate is real and hate is happening in front of our eyes. It really is up to all of us to ensure, and really think about, do we contribute to the hate that people are experiencing or do we believe in humanity and the good of humanity?"
Silence is violence, and it's good that California, as one of the most powerful states in the union, is choosing to use its voice when the cacophony of attacks from the far right feel deafening and effective.
We've all seen the news stories about hate crimes or the targeting of vulnerable communities — most recently and tragically the mass shooting at an LGBTQ club in Colorado. But those events don't give the full picture of just how much people are turning toward violence based on race, religion or gender identity, even in California, where we pride ourselves on tolerance.
Brian Levin, director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at Cal State San Bernardino and another hate commission member, has spent a lifetime tracking those numbers. What he sees is alarming.
Anti-gay hate crimes were up 51% in major U.S. cities in 2021 compared with the previous year — and they rose 48% in California. Los Angeles has seen a 59% rise in anti-transgender crimes so far in 2022, according to Levin, from 17 reported incidents last year to 27 this year.
And we've got a month to go.
Those weren't even the worst jumps. Anti-Asian hate crimes started spiking at the beginning of the pandemic, when then-President Donald Trump dubbed COVID-19 the China flu, pronouncing it as if he'd never heard the country's name spoken aloud, just another dog whistle of racism. Asian hate crimes have increased ever since, up 224% in 2021 — though they seem to be dropping in many places in 2022.
Anti-Jewish hate crimes rose 59% in major cities in 2021 compared with the previous year, as far-right pundits continue to push conspiracy theories that resurrect the long-running trope that Jewish people secretly control the world. That likely contributed to a 47% increase in attacks on houses of worship in California between 2020 and 2021 — not all in synagogues.
One of the most concerning aspects of rising hate crimes for commission member Erroll Southers is their increasing tie to politics.
Southers is the head of safety and risk assurance at the University of Southern California, and has worked for the FBI and other law enforcement agencies. In the years after 9/11, then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger appointed him to oversee protection of California's infrastructure from terrorist threats.
A few years ago, hate crimes weren't as mainstream, he said, and weren't as tied to our political discourse.
Levin points out that for the most part, the open discussion of hate was frowned upon by larger society, leaving those with extreme views on the far outskirts of acceptability. Maybe we'd ignore Uncle Joe's casual racism at the dinner table, but fascism in broad daylight was a different kind of line (though it shouldn't be).
Now, hate campaigns against vulnerable groups are de rigueur for rabid right-wing media savants such as Tucker Carlson, who doubled down on spiteful anti-transgender rhetoric immediately after the Colorado shooting.
For months, Carlson and other conservative commentators have pounded on the ugly and untrue idea that gender-affirming care is "mutilation," and that there is a conspiracy in the LGBTQ community to "sexualize" children. A few weeks ago, Carlson went so far as to encourage viewers to "fight back" against the LGBTQ community, "no matter what the law says."
I'll take a moment to remind us all that Carlson's name has been bandied about as a presidential contender. That kind of rhetoric from an influential figure with a large following can have devastating effect, said Southers.
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